


Don't Remind Me

by Pent



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Amusement Parks, Bittersweet, F/M, Friendship/Love, Humor, Reminiscing, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-23
Updated: 2010-07-23
Packaged: 2018-02-27 18:14:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2702492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pent/pseuds/Pent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vincent Valentine failed to see the 'amusement' in amusement parks. Surely someone in AVALANCHE would agree with him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Remind Me

A cacophony of mechanical ringing bells, laughter, and obnoxious beeping noises tore though his ears like a wild, raging animal. The ridiculous amounts of flashing, blinding colorful lights in every which way were making him sick. Happy, happy, fun, fun! The sounds were irritating, the lights were nauseating. Vincent Valentine was in hell.

The man lowered his red eyes to the garbage-littered cement ground. A numbing, throbbing sensation was thrashing at the back of his skull and the team was hardly in the hellish area known as the Gold Saucer. They stood by the entrance, discussing what to do next to find Sephiroth. Vincent might have joined in if it weren't for the hypnotizing beams shining straight into his eyes. He huffed a growl, disgusted.

"Cloud," Vincent wheezed, dizzy from the lights and noise.

Cloud turned towards Vincent, who had pulled his tattered red cape up further than it had been previously. Before the spiky-haired mercenary could even think about moving his lips in response to Vincent, a fat chocobo bounced in front of Vincent and started flapping its over-sized wings.

"Welcome to the Gold Saucer! Wark waaaaark!" it cawed obnoxiously. On impulse, Vincent ripped out his menacing gun and shoved it into the chocobo's feathery, smiling face. As he expected, it was not a fat chocobo and very much a scared to death man in a chocobo costume. "Waahh!" the chocobo screamed as it fell onto it's furry costume butt. Its unmovable, over-joyed chocobo helmet face stared goofily up at Vincent. Vincent glared down at the chocobo with angry eyes as it scooted away without so much as another 'wark'.

"Never mind, Cloud," Vincent muttered darkly, figuring that he might as well endure the pain of the money-sucking hell trap. Maybe he was right. Maybe the party needed a break. Cloud shrugged and went up a rather cheesy gatekeeper selling the passes into the Gold Saucer. Vincent was just satisfied that they weren't using  _his_  hard-earned gil. Sighing, Vincent's eyes lingered over the seizure-ensuing moogle-filled entrance again, wondering how anyone in their right mind could enjoy this eye-stabbing, ear-splitting doom.

Vincent scanned over the party in hopes that he wasn't the only one miserable about their current status. The only ones who seemed to be less than relieved about the amusement park were Red XIII and Barret. On further inspection, Vincent realized that he could not tell if Red XIII was happy or not, so he put him in the not category. Barret's situation was understandable, having just had an unfortunate encounter with an old friend. The others looked like they were enjoying themselves, much to Vincent's dismay. He would have been happy for them if he could even  _think_  over the annoying music that filled the air.

After Cloud payed the ridiculous amount of gil to get into the damn place, the cheesy gatekeeper explained that to do anything in the park, they had to pay more gil. That was how Vincent interpreted it. When we finally entered the moogle-dreamland, Barret seemed to snap and enough to make him storm away  _further into the park_. Vincent watched him like a hawk as he stormed through the sickening rainbow room and down a tube to another area of the amusement park. Yes,  _tube_.

Cloud horrifyingly suggested that we split up. Vincent discretely hung around the rainbow colored, tube filled room and planned make his escape back to the entrance when everyone left. Unfortunately, they didn't.

"Hey Vince," Yuffie chatted nonchalantly. Vincent blinked at her, dizzy from the rainbow engulfing both of them. Yuffie giggled and nudged him playfully. "Let's go!"

"If by go, you mean back to North Corel; then indeed, let's."

"Don't be a sourpuss!" Yuffie exclaimed bitterly, sticking her tongue out a Vincent and flipping her short hair. Vincent didn't reply to her, deeply disturbed by the happy noises of the amusement park that had unfortunately gotten louder inside the rainbow tunnel. He could have sworn they were playing an annoying  _lalalalala_ over and over again, just to make him go ape-shit and throw his gil everywhere. If that would make everything stop, then he would have done so without so much as a blink.

"Come on, you'll have fun," Yuffie cajoled.

Vincent stared again at the hypnotic walls and tried to focus on Yuffie instead. "I'm sure that Cloud, Aeris, or someone would get more out of your presence than I would. I intend to leave this place at once." Unfortunately, the young girl had her mind set on other things.

"No," she said with a wavering whine. "They don't like me."

Vincent closed his eyes and sighed at her childishness, feeling the faint, returning throb at the back of his head. The beginnings of a terrible migraine were forming rather viciously. "Yuffie, don't say such nonsense. We all value you as an important member of AVALANCHE."

" _You_ might. Not everyone else," Yuffie muttered with a cute little pout and hard glare. Vincent could feel the monsters within him start to growl and thrash around as a result of the terrifyingly happy _lalalalala_ music buzzing through the theme park like a preacher of the devil. That was the last straw for Vincent. He bit his lip slightly. "This way, Yuffie," he said ruggedly, trying to out-speak the noises.

He hastily took off back towards the outside entrance of the park, stumbling slightly like a disoriented drunkard. "Come again!" the gate keeper crooned obnoxiously. Vincent was never going back into that tacky, flashy, deafening hell. No way. Vincent made his way to a cozy looking dark spot beside the building housing the machine that had gotten them to the Gold Saucer and sat down, trying to rid himself of the colorful flashes that haunted his eyelids and pounding headache. To his slight surprise, Yuffie had followed.

"Vince, haven't you ever been here? I think you would like it if you gave it a chance. It's fun! Even for you! We all could use a break."

Even for me? Was I unable to have fun in their eyes? "Of course I've been here before. I just have a headache," Vincent murmured. Lucrecia had dragged him to the Gold Saucer on a whim many years ago. Vincent's eyes softened, having brought up such a poisonous memory. He longed for those blissful and naive days again. Vincent tightened his fist and tried to repress the thoughts.

"Yuffie, we can't have you thinking that your party members don't value you. Trust has a lot to do with a persons' performance in battle."

The young ninja sighed heftily and threw herself down next to Vincent, a bit too close for his comfort. "It's stupid!" she exclaimed, obviously frustrated. "I mean, ever since we got back from Wutai, no one's been treating me the same! Yeah, I took all your materia, but I gave it back! I even explained myself... reasonable, right? I was just trying to help my hometown prosper and go back to its normal self. If you didn't notice, it turned into some crummy tourist town! Where's the honor in that?"

The emotional Yuffie went on and on, tearing out her frustrated heart and handing it to Vincent raw. Vincent sat and listened attentively, acknowledging the girl occasionally. He stared at the bright flashing lights peeking over the entrance of the colorful Gold Saucer, some beaming lights even disturbing the darkness of the peaceful night sky. There were no stars that night and the sky had a navy tint to it, being lit by the dull moon. Vincent stared at the sky as Yuffie continued to release her frustrations.

Vincent wondered why Yuffie had picked him as her emotional support. He, admittedly, was not the best candidate for such a cause. Vincent was an emotional wreck with shards of glass sticking out of his open, bleeding wounds that would never fully heal.

To Vincent's surprise, listening to the young ninja's rant allowed him to clear his mind. Such a thing was certainly needed at the time. Vincent was as stressed out as the rest of the party. Chasing Sephiroth was exhausting on many different levels. Yuffie finished speaking and was breathing heavily. Tears glistened in her big, glaring eyes but did not fall. They were not the kind of tears that ever fell. Her teeth were heavily clenched.

Vincent wanted to say something to calm the girl, but he lacked the skills to comfort anyone at all. He debated on whether or not to remain silent or talk to Yuffie. Out of nowhere, he subconsciously picked the ladder. "Life isn't fair," he said shortly. He didn't sympathise with Yuffie; he couldn't. Vincent hoped that this was the right sort of response to these kinds of things.

Yuffie sighed and slunk her chest down onto her bent legs, adjusting her headband. "I know... how come you don't treat me like I'm in the way, Vince?"

"Because you're not," Vincent responded bleakly, staring into the natural sky above the obnoxious lights of the Gold Saucer. "The only hindrance you have put on our party thus far was taking our materia in Wutai, which turned out to be beneficial in the long run."

Yuffie's head flopped down onto Vincent's shoulder and he unintentionally tensed from the  
contact. "Sorry to vent on you like that..."

"It's alright," Vincent said, hoping that Yuffie would soon take her head of his shoulder. It wasn't that he didn't like the contact as it were anyone else. It reminded him of Lucrecia too much. It was painful. Vincent shook slightly and closed his eyes, trying to rid his mind of such lamentations. Why did it hurt? Why did Yuffie remind him of Lucrecia at a time like this?

"Jeez Vince, are you cold?" Yuffie inquired. Vincent averted his eyes. He did not realize that he had started to shake. Vincent nodded and stood up, awkwardly taking Yuffie with him. He didn't mind, though.

"Let's go back," Vincent said, already loathing his decision. His head grimaced in protest, but Vincent needed an excuse to get away from the situation he was in. Vincent did not need to think about Lucrecia right now. It was an odd feeling and he would rather endure a more familiar and recent feeling, even if the feeling was pain to cover it up.

It was frightening, experiencing that feeling again. Vincent did not know if it was a happy feeling or not, but he did not want to go through it again. It felt wrong... he was betraying to Lucrecia.

"Welcome to the Golden Saucer! You can buy a pass for a measly 3,000 gil or a lifetime pass for only 30,000 gil!" the cheesy gatekeeper exclaimed. Vincent glared at him from behind his cloak.

"Hey, mister we already payed, remember?" Yuffie said angrily.

"No ma'am," he said with an annoying trace of a smirk. Vincent clenched his teeth together in irritation and brought his gun out once again, holding it with his claw this time for more effect. The gate keeper immediately paled and nervously began to laugh. "No, no, no! I remember you two now! Go right on in! Enjoy!"

The two entered the hell hole once more. Vincent again was nauseated by the music and lights. His headache roared roared in protest from his decision but he knew that it was for the better. Vincent was nervous that Yuffie had unintentionally provoked such feelings and memories from him.

"Vincent! Yuffie! There you are!" an alarmed-looking Tifa exclaimed as she hopped into the rainbow room from one of those spiteful looking tubes of death. "It's terrible... come quickly!" she stuttered, eyes filled with panic.

"Right!" Yuffie said, immediately going into combat mode. Her eyes narrowed and she ran up to Tifa. Vincent nodded and followed Tifa as well, wondering what could have possibly gone wrong at such a place. Vincent slicked out his gun and twitched in anger as he jumped through the tube right behind Yuffie.

 _Yuffie,_ Vincent thought darkly.  _You're more of a benefit to AVALANCHE than you know. We would surely fall apart without your positive attitude._

Vincent squeezed his eyes shut during his unpleasant trip trough the brightly lit tube and could hardly wait until he hit solid ground again.  _I hope you never doubt us again no matter how much we tease. We need you, Yuffie, and I hope that the others realize it soon._

Vincent barely had time to reconfigure himself before he quite literally hit the ground running after Yuffie and Tifa through the surreal-looking bright scenery. His gun was loaded and he was ready to kill.

_Why do you remind me me so much of her?_


End file.
